


3 AM

by chrissy2



Series: When We Were Young [3]
Category: Guns N' Roses
Genre: M/M, Multi
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-02-07
Updated: 2019-02-12
Packaged: 2019-10-22 16:25:58
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 4
Words: 4,944
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/17666024
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/chrissy2/pseuds/chrissy2
Summary: Parties at the Witching Hour could get as intense as they sound.A flashback chapter for "When We Were Young" and "Home".





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> I own nothing and I make no money.

Most rock stars' nights and early mornings nowadays (except for maybe Ozzy; his pilots always hated flying with him because of the never ending parties), when they were at home--or anywhere else, really--were about as still and quiet as any other person's eve and twilight. Most of them being fifty or older, it's not like they really have a choice on the matter. Everything hurts now. They can't fuck as long and hard as they used to. They can't hear as well. And they probably couldn't survive another overdose. They couldn't even handle hangovers well anymore.

But those times in their youth were really something. Just like how the youth of the sixties said in the seventies--"If you grew up in the sixties, you never forgot it"--the same could be said about the eighties; the best the world had ever been at that point. (Those two decades seemed to be the Roaring Twenties of the modern world. Now it had gone to shit yet again. And this time, things looked so dyer that it may not be able to handle another Roaring Twenties. Hopefully it would better in the future. Maybe their youth wouldn't be like them.) The drugs were stronger, the sex was wilder, and the music was uncontrollable. Those eve-twlight rock parties sometimes were enough to make you not even remember your own name for a couple of days afterwards.

Everyone reacted differently to the drugs. The sixties and seventies were big on acid. The eighties were big on blow, speed, heroin, and all kinds of pills (that ironically came out of the sixties and seventies, from doctors that were trying to find things to replace lobotomies and shock therapy).

Axl did pretty much everything until he saw what it did to his friends. In the beginning, years before he started for California, he first did it all to rebel against his family. He never did anything wrong. He did all that he was told to do. Then they started accusing him of doing drugs when he hadn't smoked one cigarette or had enough tolerance to handle a little wine cooler.

Doing drugs while you were hitchhiking around the nation, penniless and having nothing to lose, here today and gone tomorrow--it seemed so different. Doing drugs while rich and famous and living in the biggest neighborhood in Hollywood, having all that you could ever want and need at your fingertips--it wasn't fun at all. It was like being a ghost with meat and bones.

He stopped doing blow and smack when he saw what it did to Baz and Slash. Baz was so pure when he started alongside Bon Jovi. Saul? Not so much. That guy did everything at thirteen: sex, drugs, alcohol, kleptomania. He was not as innocent as Baz, but doing all those things was still thrilling for him. Then apparently, fame and fortune dulled it all out. They all thought it was supposed to make the experience better. They were in the best time of the world; they ruled the world. Why was it doing this to them. Why were they so empty, so angry.

Baz grew more and more reckless and violent, and Axl was worse. His fits had never gotten this bad.

Axl, in those times, came to realize that the times he valued the most were when he lived in Slash's grandmother's home, sleeping the days away in his rented room in the basement while Saul went to work and school (their last attempt at giving him an education). It was like a quiet oasis in the storm that was his entire life, the nightmares for memories. But his sleep wasn't all that great either. They were littered with bad imagery, and that might have been why he responded to Saul's grandmother in the shittiest way possible when she woke him up that one day, and kindly asked him to get off the couch, in  _her own home,_ to watch  _her shows._

When Saul came home in the evenings and it was just the two of them in his room full of snakes and guitars, they would have wonderful talks. Sometimes they didn't even need a smoke or a shot to loosen up. They tell each other everything. Axl even told him about his time in Indiana, and that wasn't something he talked to just anyone about. Axl went on and on and on, and Saul listened; really listened. It seemed to be a mutually beneficial thing: Axl had a lot he needed to let out and Saul did not like talking all that much, usually preferring others to do that for him. His talking was mostly through his actions.

Axl knew he was listening from his physical responses: his body language, his facial features, the shift in his gaze.

He remembered how sad he looked when Axl opened up about his biological father, and what he did to him. He remembered how increasingly hurt and frustrated he seemed to get when he went a bit further with the details; how he would come across men and women just like his father in his travels, how they pushed him and grabbed him and expected "rewards" for favors.

That might have been another reason why he was quick to snap, quick to run away. He never knew who he could trust in the jungle.

But with Slash...he didn't know what it was.

He didn't didn't know what it was about the guy that made him loosen up. It was a slow build up, but he had never been that way before. Perhaps it was because even though he could be grumpy and tough, he was also quick to be gentle and sensitive. His voice sometimes dropped to a tone that was vulnerable and trusting; playful, sweet. There were times he was also easily hurt. But instead of getting mad, he'd try to just hold it in and bear it with sad eyes.

Axl and Saul grew to be comfortable with each other in the small room. They shared the bed, and that is something Axl was not so quick to doing. (Though there was that tiny voice at the back of his mind telling him that if Saul were to attempt to do anything, he'd just scream and his mom and grandmother would hear; or he'd just fight like hell, like he did a number of times before. There had to be some part of him that mentally prepared itself for distrust, that disappointment.) When Saul continued to prove to be respectful and trusting, the embraces and cuddling happened more and more. Then Axl grew comfortable with smoking more than usual, drinking more than usual around him. The more he smoked or drank, the more vulnerable he was. He had had people attempt to touch him while under the influence, when he was weak and his limbs felt like lead and he had a hard time fighting them off.

They only experimented a couple of times before the car incident. To Axl's surprise, it was he who started it. He had his head on Saul's shoulder after smoking a bowl (it was the kind that made him almost dreadfully tired, eyes barely open, barely processing anything, the type that would make him sit in the same spot for hours), and he was listening to Saul play. He was randomly picking at an acoustic in his lap. Whenever his sleepy gaze looked over at his fingers, he couldn't help but think about how gentle he was being with them (or maybe that was the weed, making everything go in slow motion). When he looked up at Saul's face, he saw that his eyes were closed. He was simply feeling the flow of the music through touch. He was so raw right now. So amazing.

Axl straightened his head up a bit, and slowly inched closer and closer, kissing him at a corner of his lips. Saul doesn't react as strongly as he expects; just a little shy chuckle: "Why?"

Axl can't help but shyly laugh too. "I was curious. Does it bother you."

"Not really, no."

Saul continued playing a little longer and Axl just stared at him. Then he leans in and kisses him again. This time, they don't laugh. Saul's hands remain on the instrument in his lap while Axl grabs his head and continues kissing. Both are responding, but it's mostly Axl. Saul is just letting him explore, opening up for his tongue.

After Axl has had his taste, they wipe their mouths and continue on like it didn't happen. When they came too an hour or two later, they barely remembered it. They wondered if it was a dream.

Axl can't remember if the second time was within a few hours after the kiss or if it was on a different day. They got high again and this time, they weren't so tired or dazed. They had a little bit more control over their bodies and wits. Just enough for a lay on Saul's bed, Axl below and Saul above, their tongues exploring yet again and it is more passionate and breath-taking this time. Both are giving and receiving equally. Their shirts were off before it happened. It was a particularly hot day. So it wasn't a concern when Axl reached for Saul's buckle and when he slid through and grabbed him and Saul gasped into his mouth--mother of god, it was like he was feeling something you might only feel in paradise. Those breathy moans--they haunted his thoughts many times after that. Axl could listen to them all day and night. 

Axl releases him and his cock is beautiful. They are both now breathing heavily as Axl jerks him hard and fast, Saul getting off on the heat of building pleasure and Axl getting off on just listening to the sounds Saul is making--those animal groans, him trying not to be too loud or expressive. After a bit, Saul then reaches down into Axl's jeans and Axl lets out a whimper when pulled out. It was like Saul knew Axl's hand and arm was getting tired. He pushed Axl's jerking hand off and continued the rolling waves of pleasure by holding them both in one hand and the only way they could make any more noise was by reconnecting their mouths and releasing their sounds into each other.

They are both somehow dripping with sweat, feeling the beads roll down from the backs of their knees and down their abdomens when they finally climax all over Axl's chest. In order to stifle their sounds, Axl leans into Saul's hair and Saul leans down to bite hard into Axl's neck. It was nearly so hard a bite, he could have tore him up. And he wouldn't have cared at all.


	2. Chapter 2

A few years later, Guns N Roses is large enough for international shows and to have their own plane, and Baz will not stop pestering them about it. Every day, he'd call them and beg to fly in the plane with them and they always said no. Can I fly in the plane with you guys? No, Baz. Please? No. Please? No.

Pretty please? No. Please, please, please, please! No, no, no, no, and no.

Then one day, Baz called and they did the usual round of sibling-like bickering--just like when a kid's older sibling gets a shiny new car and was riding around with their cool new friends and they wanted so bad to tag along--and in the middle, mentioned that he just bought a ball of opium, and  _then_ they wanted him on the plane. Well, Saul and Izzy and Steven did. Axl and Duff grew a bit weary, and sensed it in each other, but didn't say anything.

Baz actually bought it in a quest to look for blow (which he ended up finding on the plane; a good trade), but no one had it, so he ended up with opium instead, and he had no idea what opium was or how to use it. Bless his heart.

Axl and Duff silently agreed on trying to keep everyone together as they used up this big ball of opium on the Guns N Roses plane. Slash and Izzy were still pretty chill when high, acted fairy normal. It was Steven they were worried about. He was fucking crazy. He didn't break shit or anything, he was just almost completely cut off from reality. He'd pace back and forth and get defensive, say he didn't even do smack--while pulling out the needle and belt right in front of you.

(Baz would have his own little Steven incident in his house years later. Steven came over and Baz ended up kicking him out after he caught him shooting in his bathroom and coating his walls and tiles in blood. That did not stop Baz from continuing to invite Steven over, though. The only time Axl could think of Baz ever being traitorous was when he cheated on Maria. Other than that, the guy was as loyal as could be. When called out on his treason or him being at fault with something, he would get way too sorrowful about it. His innocence and loving nature was almost inhuman. And Axl wondered how he ever became lucky enough to become friends with such a person. He'd definitely say it was Baz and Saul that were the two people to save him in all ways.)

A couple of hours into the flight with Baz and his ball of opium--all seems well enough. Axl snorted a small bit, then took to keeping to himself in a corner, staring out the window quietly and looking down at all the clouds. What a beautiful sight. He thought about how so many other celebrities with their own planes were so obsorbed into themselves that they never considered this beauty.

Axl isn't sure how long he sits there, alone with the beauty of the clouds. He isn't sure how long he sits there before turning away from the window and seeing Saul sitting across from him in another chair, looking down at some notes that Axl assumed were musical notes or lyrics. 

He can't remember what they said. He thinks it might have been him that started with something like: "That a song idea?"

"Maybe."

"What's the concept?"

"Beauty."

Axl can't remember how he might have responded to such an answer. His younger self was unpredictable, so moody and constantly changing that it even gave himself whiplash. He figures his younger self might have snickered or made a cynical remark about the ridiculous romanticism or went on and on with theories about beauty.

Sometime during what he figured to be a discussion on the concept of beauty, Saul got up and joined him in the seat next to him. They look over Saul's notes and talk some more. Then Axl, completely focused on the lyrics, his mind on the beauty of the clouds out the window, starts humming and singing from the core. It's not his iconic screeching, just a soft, melancholic sigh.

He isn't sure how long he goes about humming and singing, giving Saul's lyrics a voice--when Saul gently cuts him off with a kiss. 

Axl can feel his cynicism and doubt melt away. The kiss deepens, their hands reaching to cup each other's faces, their sighs and the smacking of their lips all that they need--

"Man, you guys got any Jack?"

They can only hope that they broke away just in time and/or the intruding Baz was too clueless or his usual naive self to figure the situation out. Figure out why they both seemed flushed and hazy-eyed and speechless.

"Baz," Axl finally croaks, "you become a pain in the ass when you drink Jack. Like you need that right now."

"Hey, I do not! And you're no fun."

 

 

There were so many parties, Axl couldn't remember what year or where it was. Was it at a club? One where they had rooms for people to do that? No. It was someone's house. It had to have been rather large for everyone to have gotten fucked up on something and found someone and some place to fuck, and then not remember afterwards; two people, threesomes, orgies; in the closets, in the bathrooms, on the pool table in the basement, outside in a dark shadows of the back yard, in the cars parked outside, on the cars, in the storage shed nearing the trees, behind the shed, in the trees, with any floor space available in the house as a last resort. 

It was the loosest party they had ever seen. They had never seen so much drugs and so much fucking in their lives.


	3. Chapter 3

There has to be a lot of metalhead, Satanic weirdos out there doing rituals with how the moon looks tonight: slightly red, maybe a ring, bigger than usual. Nikki Sixx was definitely the type that would try that. Having a Satanic ritual on a blood moon would be one of the  _tamest_ things he would have done. Axl had been trying to get in touch with Nikki for a while now, but he hasn't heard from him. He's probably avoiding him on purpose; Nikki probably couldn't stand Axl. Or his touring mind just makes him too exhausted to leave his bed a lot of the time. (Baz was like that when he came home after touring. He'd sleep for hours, days; miss appointments, family gatherings; scream and throw shit at you if you dare enter his room and disturb him.)

Axl wants to ask Nikki--a junkie to junkie, who was supposed to be on his way to getting clean--if he can talk some sense into Saul, help him recover as well, but it's probably a lost cause, anyway. Nikki had more than likely given up trying being clean after a couple of days and fell down the junk hole again. Saul had been getting more and more strung out. It was getting to the point that he was wetting the bed after passing out from doing coke and shooting. It was effecting how he was playing, and it was effecting their artistic connection as song writers. 

The chemistry they started with was fading. Some nights, Saul was so fucked up, it was like he forgot about Axl's existence, and it  _hurt._

Axl could barely talk to him. He could barely get to him, make him listen when he begged him to stop this and get everything together. For the sake of their careers, for the sake of the art. He was wasting it all away. They all were. All this talent, all this passion. Even Duff, the most sensible one of them all, was on the verge of drinking himself to death.

One morning, Axl was the first to wake up and Saul passed out next to him the night before at a hotel, and Axl swore to god he thought he was dead. It did not look like he was breathing, and he looked slightly pale. Maybe it was just in his head. He could throw himself into hysterics and make himself hallucinate. All the more reason to stop drugs all together. Being sober and mentally sick was already insufferable.

Axl stood up so fast, he got light-headed. When he pushed Saul over onto his back, the guitarist still did not stir or twitch or show any sign that he was alive. Axl then pushes his hair back to lean over and place his ear onto Saul's chest, and his own racing heart and short breaths must have been so loud that he actually could not process anything else.

He straightens back up, clasps his hands together and starts beating down on Saul's chest, and Saul is startled awake.

"Ow!" Slash coughs, holding his chest and curling up. "Goddamn! Axl, what're you doing, man. Oh, god. What the hell."

Axl would have cried if he could. Out of frustration; because he was heartbroken, that he was watching his best friend fall apart before him and he didn't want to lose him. Instead, he just got pissed off, like usual; cussing and lecturing him on his habits.

Axl was trying to get all their shit together, and yet here they were--at the loosest party they had ever been to, wanting to get high.

The vicious cycles were not entirely dropped by Axl. He'd go for a week or so (it ain't long, but it's a hell of a lot longer than all the others have tried for) sober, have no luck trying to talk some sense into his bandmates or Baz or anyone else, and get a little high just to help with the stress of everyone else getting fucking high. 

Izzy knows this one guy. They find him in the living room, shoving through the dancers and dodging all the stumbling drunks and their spilling drinks. The living room is probably the only place that has something going on other than fucking. 

Guns N Roses buys a variety of stuff: pills, smack, and weed; the last for Axl, who wants to be tame tonight. He hasn't said a word since their arrival. When he's not talking up a storm or yelling or cussing, he's brooding.

After they pay for their shit, Axl scrams, running out the back door and into the back yard. At least there it's so dark, you can't see any fucking going on, and it's a bit more spacious than inside. He can breathe now, so he sits down on a stepping stone and looks up at the strongest source of light. The moon is red and intense and staring them all down, pitying their human ways. 

Axl reaches down into his pocket for his small "tobacco bowl" and lighter and he is at the beginning of another cycle. 

Smoking under a blood moon at an orgy house at the witch hour.

Might explain why he started freaking out a little.

More than a little. What did that motherfucker give him. Fuck.  _ **Fuck.**_ What was happening. What was going on. Don't pass out. Don't pass out. Don't pass out. Not out there in the grass. Don't panic. It's okay. Oh god, I can't feel my body. Am I dying. Goddamnit, please god, if I get out of this alive I swear I will never smoke or drink anything again. What was I thinking. You still have your body. You're not a ghost. You're not a ghost. Walk around. You need to move around, damnit. Walk and walk until you come to your senses.

Move, move, move, move. Breathe, breathe, breathe--

"Axl?" 

He looks around in the consuming darkness. There are some squares of light and shadow people in them. 

He knows that voice. That is the only thing he is absolutely sure about. He knows that voice, and he knows those warm, soothing hands on his arms. That's right. He has arms. He does have a body. He's not dead. But maybe he's dying? 

"Axl." 

Saul has gotten so close that he can feel his breath on him, and the tickling of his curls, and smell his musk smell. Axl reaches up and grasps Saul's shoulders, holding on tight and not intending to let go, ever. He thinks that if he lets go, he'll fall into a dark pit below him.


	4. Chapter 4

"Axl, are you okay?"

"Am I okay? No. No, man. I'm not fucking okay. I think I'm dying. Oh, god. It's not fucking funny! I feel awful."

"It's okay. Let's find a place to crash, okay?"

Saul keeps his warm, calloused hands on Axl and Axl continues to clutch his shoulders as they shuffle up the stairs of the back porch. The noises from beyond the doors - the music, the shrieks of excitement, the moans of pleasure - are ten times more powerful and Axl freezes on the spot. He shakes his head and refuses to go any further. _No way, man. I'm not going in there_. _I don't like it._ Saul talks to him for a minute or so. Axl can barely hear him. He might as well be momentarily deaf, but he has an idea of what Saul is telling him.  _Axl, we have to go in. It's just a party. Yes, I know the music's a little loud right now, but it's no louder than anything we have performed. Come on. No one will hurt you. I promise. I won't let that happen._

They pass through the doors of hell, and Axl feels like he is wandering through a series of catacombs beneath a city. As above, so below. Shameless depravity. Dark. Weak lighting. Walls of bones. Limbs of devils kicking out and reaching for them. Voices of ghosts: yelling, screaming. 

It's best to keep his head hanging down, his eyes to the floor. When he looks up, all the faces look distorted. The smiles are too big.

It's probably only a few seconds of walking through the house, but in Axl's slow, drugged mind, it feels eternal.  _Okay, stop for a moment. There are stairs. Start slow. Careful. I got you. You go first. I won't let you fall._ The stairs feel endless. When they finally reach up to a steady floor, Axl can't tell if it's the second or third floor. It was a massive house, after all. They then take a left down a dark hall. There are a couple sets of deviants going about with their unmentionables against the walls. Axl can barely make out a blowjob position.

"Saul. Saul, where are we?"

"In the house."

"The house?"

"The one Izzy took us to."

"Why are we here."

"It's closer. Better that we stay here. We're not in our right minds."

"I want go home."

Axl sees Slash's arm stretch out before him to lay his palm flat against the wall. The wall pushes back. It's not a wall. It's a door.

"Not until morning. We'll just sleep here, okay?"

Slash guides him into the room. When they are both in, Slash's warm hands are momentarily gone. Probably to close the door behind them. 

"I don't like this place." Axl is just standing there, frozen and stiff, scared to continue without Saul's guidance. He feels he may trip and fall over something without Saul's eyes.

The hands return to Axl's arms. "No one will hurt you. I won't let anyone hurt you. Ever. Okay? Not while I'm with you."

From what Axl can tell in his distorted state of mind, they are in some kind of storage room or closet or other. He didn't feel so claustrophobic with the one window there. Saul pushes him downward gently, to sit down on what Axl eventually guesses to be a mat or mattress on the floor, with no wooden skeleton holding it up.

"I'm scared." He remains still again, unmoving, as Saul's touch is momentarily gone again to retrieve some kind of sheet to wrap around Axl's shoulders.

"I know. But we're safe here. I locked the door. It's just us."

"Saul. Stay with me."

Axl does not remember falling asleep. It must have happened in a matter of seconds. When there are a series of loud thumps on the door later that night, Axl about scared himself to death. He sits straight up, feeling the cold of the wetness from his body - trying to extract whatever kind of drug he had through sweat, Axl guessed. His breaths are short and hoarse and ragged and his mouth feels as dry as a desert. "What was that? Saul. Saul, are you there?"

He is. Thank god. The shadow of Slash sits up, those warm hands on his arms again. "Axl, you're not thinking straight. It's okay. They just left."

"Who? Who just left?"

"Nobody. They were just partiers looking for a room. They saw the door was locked and left."

"What are they doing here?"

"There's a party here. This is not our house."

"Who's house is it?"

"Some rich guy down the road. Izzy took us here and we are spending the night here."

Axl is glad Saul explained it all because he completely forgot. God. He never wanted to do this again. Why did he let himself fall into this trap over and over. Why did any of them do it. What was so fun about feeling like ghosts, not knowing what's going on or where they are. Who they are. Axl leans down into the shoulder of the shadow beside him, leans into the body heat. He's sweaty too and smells like shit, but he needs to know Saul is actually there.

"Touch me."

It's a breathy whisper that Axl himself cannot tell if it is a command or a plead. Axl dares to look up. He can already guess the line of words going through his guitarist's mind. The look on Saul's face shows that he is thinking the same thing. Is it something that he is ordered to do, or should he make sure Axl means what he means, understands what he is really implying. Considering his past, Saul wants to play it safe. If taken out of context, what he chooses to do next may be very risky. It may ruin their relationship, friendship or mindless curiosity or whatever the hell it was. It may ruin Guns N Roses.

In his drugged mind, Axl isn't sure how much time passes by - a few seconds, a minute, several minutes - before Saul gulps a dry gulp: "I don't want to hurt you."


End file.
